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A Maggie Sottero Bride for a Festival Jewish Wedding at Lattenbury Hill Weddings, Cambridgeshire, UK

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We love a good boho festival Jewish wedding. And Alana and Adam’s is one of the best. These two worked hard to craft a day that was 100% them – filled with tons of DIY touches, from spray painting soup cans to turn them into flower vases, having the bride’s mother bake 500 brownies for the wedding dessert, and getting friends and family together to set up the venue – and they absolutely smashed it.

This wedding was full of so many exquisite details, from the gorgeous rustic turquoise stationery suite created by Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Liv & Luc, inspired by a favorite holiday snap from a trip to Italy to the way Alana and Adam crafted a personal ceremony highlighting their shared values of feminism and equality: they both smashed a glass, gave a speech, wrote vows, and circles each other under the chuppah.

And because you can’t have a festival without awesome music, the couple opted to bring in the big guns: Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor TOTEM, who Alana and Adam picked partly for their vast experience with Jewish weddings and wide repertoire of Israeli dancing songs, kept the guests on the dance floor all night long in their signature style. We can’t get over all the love and energy captured in the photos by Aaron Collett Photography and videographer James Alexander Chapman.

Before we turn you over to Alana, we’ve also got to mention her stunner of a gown by Maggie Sottero, which she found at the wonderful Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Morgan Davies Bridal. Alana was on the hunt for a boho style figure hugging lace gown, and did the team at Morgan Davies ever help her make the dream a reality!


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HOW WE MET

 Alana, the bride: We met at a mutual friend’s engagement party 6 years ago, pretty sure we were the only single ones left in the room and were introduced to each other in an awkward year 6 disco style way. He managed to convince me he was a bomb disposal expert (he’s not) and the rest is history.

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A David’s Bride for a Nature Lovers’ Jewish Wedding at Ramat Rachel, Jerusalem, Israel

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There’s nothing like an Israeli wedding. And we’re especially in love with the beautiful Jewish wedding of Cassie, a social media manager, and Yona, who works in construction, who met while working together in Jerusalem’s Old City. Both nature lovers, we’re obsessed with the way the pair brought their enthusiasm for the outdoors into their big day.  

They opted to wed at Ramat Rachel, a kibbutz in the outskirts of Jerusalem full of wild greenery, with a verdant ketubah strewn with pink and white flowers to match.They even opted for a gorgeous nature-inspired ketubah from Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor The Delicate Brush. We’re crazy about the exquisite, joyous photos from Jonny Finkel Photography and videography by Shlomi Tzur.

Music also played a big role in Cassie and Yona’s wedding, with Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor DJ Naor keeping the guests on the dance floor until the end of the night, and the bride’s family surprising her with an original song! The bridesmaids and groomsmen got in on the action too, secretly working with the groom to choreograph a dance they all did together to surprise the bride. Aww!

Now over to Cassie, who looked like an absolute princess in her David’s Bridal gown and rose gold glitter sneakers by Keds – Kate Spade…

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Natural Vibes

We got married at Ramat Rachel which is a kibbutz in the outskirts of Jerusalem. We fell in love with all the nature when we went to visit the venue for the first time and we were sold. 

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A Spiritual, Magical Florida Backyard Jewish Wedding Reimagined Due to COVID-19

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Today’s Jewish wedding is so unbelievably, jaw-droppingly, breathtakingly gorgeous, it’s hard to believe it wasn’t the couple’s Plan A all along. But believe it or not, bride Ganga, whose work combines counseling, astrology, ritual, and ecological design to support clients through change and loss, and Seth, a strength and conditioning coach who draws on a similarly interdisciplinary background, pulled together this intimate, impromptu wedding in the bride’s mother’s back garden after their original plans were waylaid by coronavirus.

These two had a bigger wedding at an eco-retreat all lined up – and they still plan to hold that bash, with their original lineup of vendors, next year – but when the pandemic hit, they changed their plans to this pared-down backyard celebration with a focus on spirituality.

The couple, who are both training to be inter-spiritual ministers, poured themselves into developing a ceremony that felt deeply authentic to them both, from their circling around each other to the Adon Olam, to adapting the seven blessings to reflect poems and blessings from many traditions to reciting their own vows.

We also love the thought they put into selecting their gorgeous Gingko Spiral ketubah by Temma Gentles from Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor ketubah.com: the ginkgo has been around for over 300 million years, meaning it’s a true adaptor and survivor – just what we all need to be in these uncertain times.

And would you believe these exquisite photos were shot by a first-time wedding photographer? Ganga’s bridesmaid – the only one who was able to make it in the end – just happens to be mega-talented photographer Thais Aquino, who’s clearly a natural at weddings!

Now over to Ganga, the bride…

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How we met

Ganga, the bride: We met through my best friend who had been one of Seth’s students, on New Year’s Eve 2016. The first thing I remember asking Seth was what his intention for 2017 was, to which he replied, “just to be love.” That immediately told me we were on the same page in our approach to life, and within a few weeks we were learning how to be love, together.

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A Noa and Ayelet Bride for a Masquerade Jewish Wedding at Beit Shmuel, Jerusalem

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In need of a little vacation from reality? We’ve got just the thing, in the form of the fantastic masquerade-themed Jewish wedding of Devorah, who (fittingly) works in theater, and Yitzchak, who works for GoDaddy and blogs on the side – where you can read his take on the wedding.  

Because they got married on Rosh Chodesh Adar – the first day of the month of Purim, they decided their theme would be masquerade. With masks as favors and candelabras wrapped in roses on every table, this wedding could not have been more atmospheric – and how great that the guests totally got into the spirit, attending in masks and dress-up items of their own. The photos and video from Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor aya-avi – a husband and wife duo, with Aya on photography and Avi on videography – are truly breathtaking, and we’re not at all surprised to hear the couple have been receiving an endless stream of compliments on them.

We’re also obsessed with Devorah and Yitzchak’s chuppah – and not just because of the stunning views overlooking Jerusalem’s Old City. Devorah crafted the chuppah herself, using her beloved late grandfather’s tallit for the canopy, draped over wooden poles wrapped in roses. So simple, and so perfect.

We love that the couple, who are Orthodox and had a traditional ceremony, went out of their way to make sure some of their female guests could participate in the ceremony, with four women who’d played important roles in Devorah and Yitzchak’s relationship holding the poles of the chuppah, and a close friend serving as MC. And both bride and groom spoke under the chuppah – just goes to show that even the most traditional of ceremonies hold plenty of space for personalization.

And how awesome is it that these two crafted their ketubah together, with the groom taking charge of the calligraphy and the bride handling the artwork?

There’s so much more we could say, but we’ll let the bride – who looked stunning in her Noa and Ayelet dress – take it from here…

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HOW WE MET

Devorah, the bride: We met at a Shabbat meal of a mutual friend. I tried to get him to come see me perform, hoping I’d impress him and that would get the ball rolling. He never came to that run of the show. A few weeks later I invited him for a Shabbat meal I was hosting and we haven’t stopped talking since. He did make up for not showing up to my show. We did another run of the show a few months later and he proposed at the end of one of them!

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A Millanova Bride for a Destination Jewish Wedding with a View at Olmaya, Jerusalem, Israel

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Who’s ready to book a flight to Israel as soon as lockdown ends? Team STG definitely is, and you just might be too after you finish drooling over Lauren and Anthony’s stunner of a Jewish wedding.

The London-based pair picked their venue Olmaya, based on its breathtaking views of the Old City of Jerusalem – which just happens to be the place these two became friends AND got engaged. Best chuppah backdrop ever, or best chuppah backdrop ever? We’re pretty sure you’re going to be just as obsessed with the incredible photos by Haim Afriat and video by Avichai Weschsler as we are.

We’re also in love with Lauren’s gorgeous Millanova dress, which she found at Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor The Wedding Club’s Birmingham location. The bride had spotted her dream dress on Instagram three years before the big day – before she even got engaged – but, Millanova not being a widely available brand in the UK, was struggling to track the style down until she found out about a trunk show at The Wedding Club – and the rest is history!

Lauren loved the lace fishtail gown just as much as she hoped she would, and she can’t stop raving about her fab experience working with the team at The Wedding Club. In her own words, “I looked forward to every fitting, and wish I could go there every day as it was honestly the best experience.” Lauren capped her look off with a sleek high ponytail (perfect for that Israeli heat!) styled by Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Yonatan Yaeish, who not only totally got the bride’s vision but also made sure her ‘do didn’t budge all day.

Over to you Lauren!

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How we met

Lauren, the bride: I work in marketing in a Jewish charity and Anthony is a director of fundraising and development at a Jewish charity. We met at the JLE, but became friends on a trip to Israel. It was on a balcony overlooking the Kotel where the journey began, and the journey is never ending.

We got engaged on a balcony overlooking the Kotel too, and the next day after the wedding, we took all our guests to the Kotel for a special Kotel experience, we had musicians, a hand held chuppah and danced and sung our way to the Kotel, it was very special.

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